Contents

Introduction 4 Prison population 6 Prison receptions 9 Prison releases 9 Probation 10 Licence recalls 12 Appendix A – Data sources and quality 14 Appendix B – Users of Offender Management Statistics 18 Contact points 19 Introduction

This publication provides key statistics relating to offenders who are in prison or under Probation Service supervision in England and Wales. It covers flows into these services (receptions into prison or probation starts) and flows out (releases from prison or probation terminations) as well as the caseload of both services at specific points in time.

Latest figures for the quarter January to March 2014 are provided and compared to the same period in 2013 for each topic. This is with the exception of the prison population where more recent data are available (30 June 2014).

This bulletin is published alongside three inter-related bulletins:

- **Proven Re-offending Statistics Quarterly**: provides proven re-offending figures for offenders who were released from custody, received a non-custodial conviction at court, received a caution, reprimand, warning or tested positive for opiates or cocaine in the 12 months ending September 2012.

- **Safety in Custody Statistics Quarterly update to March 2014**: provides statistics on death, self harm and assault incidents whilst in prison custody.

- **Accredited Programmes, Annual Bulletin 2013/14**: provides statistics on accredited programmes undertaken across prison and probation trusts during each financial year. Key figures include the number of starts and completions by programme.

Taken together, these publications present users with a more coherent overview of offender management including re-offending among both adults and young people, and the safety of offenders whilst in prison custody.

The United Kingdom Statistics Authority has designated the statistics in this publication as National Statistics, in accordance with the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 and signifying compliance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.

Designation can be broadly interpreted to mean that the statistics:

- meet identified user needs;
- are well explained and readily accessible;
- are produced according to sound methods; and
- are managed impartially and objectively in the public interest.

Once statistics have been designated as National Statistics, it is a statutory requirement that the Code of Practice shall continue to be observed.

### Table 1: Overview – latest period compared to the previous year

| Category | 30 June 2014 | Percentage change 30 June 2013 to 30 June 2014 | |-----------------------------------------------|--------------|-----------------------------------------------| | **Prison population** | 85,509 | 2% | | Remand | 12,197 | 11% | | Untried | 8,618 | 11% | | Convicted unsentenced | 3,579 | 11% | | Sentenced | 71,481 | 1% | | Fine Defaulters | 120 | -9% | | Less than or equal to 6 months | 4,569 | -2% | | Greater than 6 months to less than 12 months | 2,081 | -3% | | 12 months to less than 4 years | 19,589 | 1% | | 4 years or more (excluding indeterminate sentences) | 27,275 | 4% | | Indeterminate sentences | 12,587 | -5% | | Recalls | 5,260 | 3% | | Non criminal | 1,831 | -6% |

| Category | 31 March 2014 | Percentage change 31 March 2013 to 31 March 2014 | |-----------------------------------------------|---------------|-----------------------------------------------| | **Prison receptions** | | | | First receptions | 26,151 | -1% | | Remand - untried | 11,817 | 4% | | Remand - convicted unsentenced | 7,987 | -1% | | Sentenced | 19,951 | -3% | | Fine Defaulters | 228 | -16% | | Less than or equal to 6 months | 9,030 | -5% | | Greater than 6 months to less than 12 months | 2,166 | -4% | | 12 months to less than 4 years | 6,199 | -2% | | 4 years or more (excluding indeterminate sentences) | 2,237 | 0% | | Indeterminate sentences | 91 | 18% |

| Category | | | | **Prison releases** | | | | Determinate sentences | 18,171 | -9% | | Less than or equal to 6 months | 7,453 | -6% | | Greater than 6 months to less than 12 months | 1,968 | -7% | | 12 months to less than 4 years | 6,479 | -11% | | 4 years or more (excluding indeterminate sentences) | 2,271 | -10% | | Indeterminate sentences | 178 | 5% | | Indeterminate sentence for public protection (IPP) | 101 | 19% | | Life sentence | 77 | -8% |

| Category | | | | **Average percentage of time served** | | | | Determinate sentences | 52% | 0pp | | Less than or equal to 6 months | 53% | 0pp | | Greater than 6 months to less than 12 months | 47% | -1pp | | 12 months to less than 4 years | 49% | 1pp | | 4 years or more (excluding indeterminate sentences) | 54% | -2pp |

| Category | | | | **Probation starts** | | | | All court orders | 40,805 | 5% | | All community sentences | 27,397 | 0% | | Community order | 26,979 | 1% | | Other sentences | 13,576 | 16% | | Suspended sentence order with requirements | 11,712 | 8% | | Pre release supervision | 10,261 | -6% |

| Category | 31 March 2014 | Percentage change 31 March 2013 to 31 March 2014 | |-----------------------------------------------|---------------|-----------------------------------------------| | **Persons supervised by the Probation Service** | | | | All court orders | 110,588 | -1% | | All community sentences | 74,456 | -3% | | Community order | 72,936 | -2% | | All pre CJA orders | 72 | -51% | | Youth rehabilitation order | 1,528 | -14% | | Other sentences | 38,595 | 2% | | Deferred sentence | 119 | 25% | | Suspended sentence order | 38,492 | 2% | | All pre and post release supervision | 109,620 | -2% | | Pre release supervision | 71,303 | 2% | | Post release supervision | 38,852 | -7% |

| Category | 31 March 2014 | | |-----------------------------------------------|---------------|-----------------------------------------------| | **Licence recalls** | | | | Recalled in latest quarter | 4,196 | | | Not returned to custody by 31 March 2014 | 71 | | | Total not returned to custody by 31 March 2014 | 1,030 | |

1. Average percentage of time served includes time served on remand; change in percentages are given as percentage point change (pp). Prison population

The prison population grew rapidly between 1993 to 2008, at an average of 4% a year. This rapid rise was driven by:

- Increases in the number of people sentenced to immediate custody from 1993 to 2002;
- Increases in the average custodial sentence length and increased use of indeterminate sentences; and
- Increases in the number of offenders recalled to prison following breaches of their licence conditions, along with increases in the average length of time these offenders spent in prison once recalled.

The rise in the prison population slowed considerably from the summer of 2008, in part due to the introduction of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008, which changed sentencing and offender management in ways which helped to reduce growth in the prison population.

This flatter trend continued until the public disorder seen in UK cities from 6 to 9 August 2011 which had an immediate but temporary impact on the prison population. During 2012 and into 2013, the prison population began to fall due to a falling remand population and a continued decline in the number of under 18s in custody. The falling remand population during 2012 reflected falling volumes going through the courts plus the introduction of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act (LASPO) 2012 in December 2012. This Act restricted the use of remand for offenders who would be unlikely to receive a custodial sentence.

The ‘Story of the Prison Population 1993 to 2012’ is an in-depth look at what happened to the prison population between 1993 and 2012 and the major factors contributing to the changes.

Following the LASPO Act in December 2012, and up until the end of June 2013, the prison population stabilised. In particular, by March 2013, the remand population stopped falling, which it had been since the end of August 2011. Between the end of June 2013 and the end of June 2014, the prison population increased by 2% from 83,842 to 85,509. The majority of this is explained by the remand population which increased by 11% from 10,971 to 12,197 over the same period. Changes to the sentenced population explain the rest of the increase.

The increase in the total remand population was due to a rise in the untried and convicted unsentenced populations (with proportionate increases of 11% seen in both groups), and across the majority of the different offence groups. The increase has been driven by the adult remand population, which after remaining stable up until the end of August 2013, rose sharply until the end of October 2013, and has since risen more gradually up until the end of June 2014. This has been attributed to an increase in demand on the courts, which in some cases has led to longer waiting times.

Trends in the young adult and youth remand populations do not reflect this same change. The remand population of young adults (18-20 year olds) has remained stable, and that of 15-17 year olds increased by just 2%.

The sentenced population has increased slightly by 1% from 70,913 at the end of June 2013 to 71,481 at the end of June 2014. The increase has been driven by the adult sentenced population, which rose by 2% over the period. Looking at specific offence groups, the number of sentenced adult sex offenders increased by 7% from 10,187 to 10,867 over the period. This is consistent with the increasing number of sex offenders being given custodial sentences by the courts and, more broadly, with the recent ‘Crime in England and Wales’ bulletin from the Office for National Statistics that reported an increase in sexual offences recorded by the police for the year ending March 2014. Again these changes are not reflected in the young adult and youth populations, which decreased by 11% and 19% respectively.

Additionally, the increase in the adult sentenced population is related to higher numbers serving determinate sentences of twelve months or more. Much of the increase in the numbers serving long determinate sentences is due to the LASPO Act, introduced in December 2012. This Act abolished the Indeterminate Sentence for Public Protection (IPP) and introduced the new Extended Determinate Sentence (EDS), which is available for offenders who would previously have received an IPP or an extended sentence. As at the end of June 2014 there were 1,043 offenders serving an EDS.

Of the 12,587 prisoners serving indeterminate sentences (IPP or life), down 5% on the previous year, just over 40% were serving IPPs and just under 60% were serving life sentences. The fall in the number of IPPs of 9% from the previous year is down to abolition of these sentences under LASPO in December 2012. On 30 June 2014 there were 3,620 IPP prisoners in custody past their tariff expiry date (71% of the current IPP population) and 2,557 lifers who were past their tariff (34% of all lifers). The number of whole lifers in prison at the end of June 2014 was 48, with six additional life prisoners being treated in secure hospitals.

Over the longer term, an increasing proportion of sentenced prisoners are serving sentences for more serious offences – the proportion serving sentences for sexual offences increased from 10% in 2000 to 16% at the end of June 2014. Similarly, 27% of the sentenced population had committed violence against the person offences, up from 21% in 2000. Sentence lengths have increased, with 66% of determinate sentenced prisoners serving between 12 months and more than 4 years, and 18% of all sentenced prisoners serving indeterminate sentences.

In contrast, the number serving sentences for motoring offences has fallen steadily over time, now comprising 1% of the sentenced population compared with 4% in 2000, and the proportion serving sentences for burglary has fallen from 17% in 2000 to 10% at the end of June 2014.

The foreign national population in custody is 10,834 on 30 June 2014, making up 13% of the whole prison population, which is consistent with previous periods.

A 6% drop in the number of non-criminals in prison reflects a revised agreement with Home Office to reduce the number of immigration detainees in the prison estate, following an earlier agreement which increased these numbers in the last quarter. Prison receptions

First receptions provide an indication of the number of new prisoners in a time period. A person received into prison to serve a sentence may previously have been received on remand after conviction prior to sentence and before that as a remand prisoner awaiting trial. First receptions will count that prisoner only once in the relevant time period in which they were first received.

In the most recent quarter there were 26,151 first receptions into prison, a fall of 1% compared to the same period in the previous year. Juvenile and young adult receptions decreased across all sentence lengths, apart from young adults sentenced to less than or equal to six months. For adults, unsentenced remand receptions and receptions for longer sentences of 4 years or more (including indeterminates) increased by one and five per cent respectively, but shorter sentence receptions of under 12 months fell by 3%.

Between the quarters ending March 2013 and March 2014, untried receptions increased for the most serious offences (violence against the person 11%, sexual offences 12%) and drugs offences (5%), but decreased for motoring offences (16%), robbery (14%) and burglary (8%). In the unsentenced population receptions increased for violence against the person (3%) and fraud and forgery (4%), but decreased for motoring (30%) and drugs (12%) offences.

The number of prisoners received under sentence in the quarter ending March 2014 fell by 3% compared to the quarter ending March 2013. This reflects an increase in sentenced receptions for sexual offences (14%), but decreases for all other offence groups (in particular fraud and forgery (12%), and robbery and burglary (both 11%)).

The rise in numbers received into prison to serve a long determinate sentence partly reflects the impact of sentencing changes introduced in December 2012 which introduced the new Extended Determinate Sentence. These changes also resulted in a large fall in the number of offenders entering prison to serve an indeterminate sentence.

Prison releases

Statistics on people being released from prison have been previously called discharges. Whilst the term ‘discharge’ is used operationally for the process of a prisoner being released from prison, it is not immediately clear to users what this represents. Therefore, in this edition of OMSQ, and in future editions, what has previously been called ‘discharges’ will now be called ‘releases’. No changes to the method, recording practices, or data sources used for prisoner discharges/releases have been made. A total of 18,349 offenders were released from custody in the quarter ending March 2014, a fall of 9% since March 2013, including a 9% decrease in determinate releases across all sentence lengths, in particular for both males and females serving longer sentences.

There were 101 offenders released from an IPP and a further 77 from a life sentence, making up a 5% increase for releases from indeterminate sentences. In addition, 17 indeterminate sentenced prisoners were removed under the Tariff Expired Removal Scheme (TERS). This scheme allows indeterminate sentenced foreign national prisoners, who are liable to removal from the UK, to be deported from the country on or after the date of their tariff expiry without reference to the Parole Board. The scheme began in May 2012, and by the end of December 2013 there had been 222 removals in total.

Average sentence lengths of those released remained stable, with a 2% increase in releases from sentences of less than 6 months, 5% increase for sentences of 4 years or more, and no changes for the other sentence lengths. Average time served also remained relatively stable, as did percentage of sentence length served.

The number of offenders released on Home Detention Curfew (HDC) continues to fall, and did so by 18% to 2,167 between the quarters ending March 2013 and March 2014. To be considered for release under HDC an offender must be serving a sentence of less than 4 years and the number of offenders serving such sentences has been falling (see earlier population section). The decrease in the eligible population will have a direct impact on the number that can be considered for HDC release and the number that are subsequently released.

Between January and March 2014, there were 125,332 releases on temporary licence (ROTL) from prisons in England and Wales. This is a 1% increase since January to March 2013. This is due to an increase in the number of Resettlement Day Release licences, which have increased by 2%, whilst all other types of licence have shown a decrease. The number of releases for females increased by 8% compared to a 1% increase for males over the same period. The total number of individuals given at least one instance of ROTL between January and March 2014 was 5,523, which is a 9% decrease over the year. Of the individuals given at least one instance of ROTL, 15% were on an indeterminate sentence. The number of recorded temporary release failures between January and March 2014 was 78, which is an 18% decrease over the year. The number of recorded failures has shown a decrease every quarter since April to June 2013.

**Probation**

Transforming Rehabilitation is a reform programme that is changing the way offenders are managed in the community. Key aspects of the reforms include creating a new public sector National Probation Service (NPS) to work with the most high-risk offenders, and forming 21 new Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs) to manage medium and low-risk offenders. The new NPS and 21 CRCs have been operational since 1 June 2014, and from that point Probation Trusts ceased to exist. However since the reporting period for this bulletin covers January to March 2014, we have continued to publish statistics at Probation Trust level in the accompanying tables. Plans on how to change the relevant tables have been set out in the ‘Changes to Offender Management Statistics Quarterly’ document, published on 24 July 2014 at the link below: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/changes-to-offender-management-statistics-quarterly-and-annual-editions

The total annual probation caseload (court orders and pre and post release supervision) increased by 39% between 2000 and 2008 to 243,434. Since then the probation caseload has fallen year on year, reaching 219,588 at the end of 2013, down 2% from the previous year.

As at the end of March 2014, the total caseload fell again to 218,671 – down 2% compared to the end of March 2013.

Figure 1.2: Number of offenders under Probation Service supervision (at end December), 2003-2013

Note: the total number of offenders is overstated as some appear in more than one category.

The court order caseload decreased slightly by 1% to 110,588, with the community order caseload falling 2% but the suspended sentence order (SSO) caseload rising by 2% between the quarters ending March 2013 and 2014. However, the number of offenders starting community orders increased slightly over this period, rising by 1% to 26,979, whilst starts of SSOs with requirements attached increased by 8% to 11,712. In addition, in the quarter ending March 2014 there were over 1,700 starts of SSOs without requirements attached. This brings the total number of stand-alone SSOs starts to 6,350 since they were introduced under the LASPO Act 2012 (see data sources and quality section).

The caseload of offenders supervised before or after release from prison showed a decrease of 2% between the quarters ending March 2013 and 2014 to 109,620, with those supervised under post release falling by 7% to 38,852, consistent with the falling trend in prison releases. The number of pre-release supervision starts fell by 6% to 10,261, in line with prison receptions where the number of offenders starting prison sentences continues to fall.

The number of requirements started under court orders showed a rise roughly in line with the increase in court order starts. However, there has been a notable rise in curfews, and standalone curfews in particular (up 31% to 4,231 for community orders). This may reflect the impact of a mandatory punitive requirement in every community order, introduced from December 2013 under the Crime and Courts Act 2013.

Of the court orders terminated in the quarter ending March 2014, almost two-thirds were terminated successfully (either ran full course or terminated early for good progress). This was true for both Community Orders and SSOs, and is broadly stable when compared to the same time last year.

The number of court reports prepared by the Probation Service continued to fall – a total of 40,012 court reports were prepared in the quarter ending March 2014, 10% down on the quarter ending March 2013, reflecting the continuing downward trend in the number of cases being dealt with by the courts. The decrease was driven by a large fall in the number of Standard PSRs (Pre-Sentence Reports) and fast delivery oral reports, which fell by 17% and 13% respectively. Fast delivery written reports also fell (down 3%).

In general, courts follow the sentences proposed in PSRs, particularly where an immediate custodial sentence has been recommended - 87% of such proposed sentences in PSRs resulted in immediate custody.

**Licence recalls**

Offenders serving a sentence of twelve months and over are, in most cases, released from prison automatically at the half way point of their sentence, under licensed supervision to the Probation Service. They are all subject to a set of standard licence conditions, requiring them to report regularly to the Probation Service, live at an address approved by the Probation Service, and to be of good behaviour.

A key element of public protection is that offenders released on licence should be effectively supervised in the community and swiftly recalled to custody if their behaviour gives cause for concern. It is explained to offenders at the outset that they may be recalled to custody if they breach any of the conditions of their licence.

There are various reasons why offenders are recalled to custody for breaching their licence conditions besides committing a further offence. For example, an offender may be recalled if there is any deterioration in behaviour which leads the Probation Service to conclude that there is an increased risk of the offender committing further offences.

Over the period 1999 to March 2014, a total of 658,000 offenders were released from prison on licence supervision. Between April 1999 and March 2014, 173,013 of those released on licence were recalled to custody for breaching the conditions of their licence, e.g. failing to report to their probation officer. Of all those recalled, just 1,030 had not been returned to custody by the end of March 2014. This number is a cumulative total since 1984, and therefore it will tend to increase over time. However the proportion of prisoners not returned to custody over this period is 0.6% and this is a relatively constant figure when compared to previous years. This total may include some offenders believed to be dead or living abroad but who have not been confirmed as dead or deported.

Of the 1,030 not returned to custody by 31 March 2014, 129 had originally been serving a prison sentence for violence against the person offences, and a further 37 had been serving a prison sentence for sexual offences.

During the quarter ending 31 March 2014, a total of 4,196 offenders were recalled to custody and 71 had not been returned by 30 June 2014. This number is likely to decrease over time as police have more opportunity to locate and arrest these offenders.

The end-to-end measure across all agencies involved in the process is for 75 per cent of recalled offenders to be returned to custody within 74 hours for emergency recalls and 144 hours for standard recalls. In the quarter ending 31 March 2014, 81% (3,394) were returned within agreed timescales, up 2.4 percentage points from the quarter ending December 2013. Appendix A – Data sources and quality

The data presented in this publication are drawn from administrative IT systems. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system. While the figures shown have been checked as far as practicable, they should be regarded as approximate and not necessarily accurate to the last whole number shown in the tables. Where figures in the tables have been rounded to the nearest whole number, the rounded components do not always add to the totals, which are calculated and rounded independently.

Impact of data quality issues and revisions

Population data

Routine data quality checks identified an issue with how offenders who are held post-sentence awaiting deportation are recorded within the population data. At any given time, around 300 offenders who should be recorded as non-criminals, wrongly remained recorded as sentenced prisoners. This issue has been resolved with effect from April 2013 and revised figures have been provided in all tables reporting the prison population by type of custody and offence.

While it was not possible to also carry out the data quality work on data prior to April 2013, it is likely that the impact would have been similar (around 300 non-criminal prisoners incorrectly recorded as sentenced prisoners at both points in time).

Receptions data

Following the introduction and phased roll-out of a new case management system for prisons (prison-NOMIS) from May 2009, data collection issues emerged that affected the supply of data for statistical purposes. The vast majority of issues were resolved in March 2010; however, prison receptions data for 2010 is unavailable due to problems in the supply of data for statistical purposes.

Analysis of the receptions data in early 2010 identified a problem with the way reception dates were being handled in the data extract used centrally (operations within prisons were unaffected). In terms of producing the statistics, this potentially affected the period for which a given reception was counted, for example Q3 2010 versus Q4 2010. Further analysis has shown that the issues predominantly affected 2010, with data from 2011 onwards impacted less.

While the data may not be accurate to the last digit, it is considered robust enough for analysis of broad trends; both over time, and between different types of reception. Probation data

From February 2013, there has been a phased introduction and rollout of a national case management information system across all Probation Trusts (n-Delius). As of 31 January 2014, all trusts have migrated to the new system.

As a result of that migration, there has been an increase in the number of offenders within the migrated trusts with tier of supervision recorded as ‘Tier not stated’. Investigations are being undertaken to identify the source of this issue.

The Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 introduced Suspended Sentence Orders (SSOs) without requirements attached. Offenders sentenced to such SSOs are not supervised by the Probation Service as there are no requirements for the offender to meet, other than to not commit a further offence – they do not therefore appear on a Probation Trust’s caseload. There have been increasing numbers of such orders given since they were introduced in December 2012, and their inclusion in the number of overall SSO starts resulted in a reversal of the general downward trend – this was seen for the first time in the quarter ending June 2013.

As the Probation Service is not required to supervise offenders with stand-alone SSOs, we have taken steps to separate these orders out and they are reported separately in Table 4.1. All other tables containing starts of SSOs exclude stand-alone SSOs (Tables 4.2 to 4.6).

Pre-sentence court reports (PSR) data

Evidence provided by Probation Trusts suggested that published statistics on the number of PSRs prepared by each trust were lower than those statistics produced by their internal case management systems.

The PSR data collection process in place until 31 March 2012 entailed each trust providing monthly data on the number of reports prepared that month, with the data extracted on or just after the 15th of the following month, e.g. data for July collected on 15th August. On investigation it emerged that many trusts, particularly those in large metropolitan areas, enter some PSRs onto case management systems after this date due to data collection practicalities. To address this issue, trusts were asked to submit each monthly return two months later than previously to allow time for additional reports to be recorded, and the impact on the statistics was assessed.

This new extended data collection process has been introduced for data from April 2012, and we estimate that the statistics now capture between 1 and 3 per cent more PSRs per quarter as reported within Tables 4.12 and 4.13.

Subsequent data quality work has shown that the introduction of a longer time lag between the date a PSR is prepared and when data is extracted from case management systems, i.e. more than two months, would capture more court report data (over and above the additional 1 to 3 per cent now included in the two most recent quarters). However, these further increases were mostly seen in the number of court reports prepared for breaches, court reviews and deferred sentences (see below). For standard and fast delivery pre-sentence reports, a two month time lag captures the vast majority of data and there are diminishing returns in extending the data collection period any further.

During the data quality work described above, it emerged that previously published data for court reviews, PSR breach reports and deferred sentences was incomplete in terms of coverage across all trusts and that there were inconsistencies between trusts in the coverage and content of the data extracted from their case management systems. This data has therefore been removed from Table 4.12 for all quarters – the estimated impact on the total number of reports written is a reduction of around 4,500 reports per quarter.

It is hoped that with the introduction and phased rollout of a national management information system (nDelius) for all Probation trusts and, since 1 June 2014, the National Probation Service (NPS), more accurate and complete data can be produced on PSR breach reports in future. This will be kept under review.

In addition, during routine data quality work carried out as part of production of last quarter’s bulletin, it emerged that there were a large number of PSRs without completion rates in large metropolitan areas, London in particular. Migration to nDelius has introduced delays to logging of PSRs and their completion rates, the impact of which was a substantial fall in the number of PSRs prepared in the second half of 2013. Our assessment at the time was that data were not considered suitable for publication.

Significant data cleaning work has since been carried out and the data are now considered to be robust and of sufficient quality to resume publication.

**HDC eligibility**

In order to bring the coverage of HDC eligibility in line with all other prison population data, figures from 2011 onwards have been taken from a different source resulting in a break in series from 2011. To aid comparison, 2011 figures within Table A3.5 have been presented using both data sources. The impact of the change in data source is a 2 per cent increase in the number eligible for HDC which results in a slight fall in the release rate (down 1 percentage point).

The increase in the number of offenders identified as being eligible for HDC in the new data source is due to improved recording of release dates which enables more prisoners to be captured in the ‘eligible’ category. Using the previous data source, if the release date for an offender was missing, they would have been excluded from the eligible category as it would not have been possible to determine at which point they were eligible to be released under HDC. Indeterminate sentences for public protection

Information relating to tariffs for IPP and DPP prisoners and those serving life sentences is held by the Offender Management and Public Protection Group, NOMS, in the Public Protection Unit Database (PPUD).

Licence recalls and returns to custody

Returned to custody – the figures for those returned to custody include people who have died or been deported by the UK Borders Agency as prior to 2007 this information was not collected separately. The information held centrally records whether or not recalled offenders are still wanted for return to custody but for those offenders no longer wanted for return to custody, information is not held on whether the recall was completed by actual return to custody or because the offender died or was deported.

Not returned to custody – this includes those offenders believed to be dead or living outside of the UK but who have not been confirmed as dead or deported.

Symbols used

| Symbol | Description | |--------|-------------| | .. | not available | | 0 | Nil or less than half the final digit shown | | - | not applicable | | * | One or both of the comparison figures are less than 50 | | (p) | Provisional data | | (r) | Revised data |

Revisions policy

Figures for prison receptions and releases for each of the first three quarters of the calendar year are generally revised alongside figures for quarter 4 in the October to December publication each year. Prison population, probation and licence recall figures are not routinely revised, but are corrected if an error is identified.

Any revisions will be accompanied by an explanation for the revision and its impact, along with – where appropriate - an assessment of whether the impact is in line with previous revisions. Appendix B – Users of Offender Management Statistics

The contents of the report will be of interest to the public, government policy makers, the agencies responsible for offender management at both national and local levels, and others who want to understand more about the prison population, probation caseload, licence recalls and returns to custody.

The statistics included in this publication are used extensively and meet a broad spectrum of user needs as shown below.

| User | Summary of main statistical needs | |-------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | MOJ Ministers | Use the statistics to monitor the prison population and capacity of the prison estate; monitor effectiveness of probation service and whether resources are deployed efficiently; assess policy impacts (e.g. changes to sentencing guidance) | | MPs and House of Lords | Statistics are used to answer parliamentary questions – approximately 100 are answered each year using prison and probation data | | Policy teams | Statistics are used to inform policy development, to monitor impact of changes over time and to model future changes and their impact on the system | | Agencies responsible for offender management | Current and historical robust administrative data are used to support performance management information at national and local levels within each agency to complement their understanding of the current picture and trends over time | | Academia, students and businesses | Used as a source of statistics for research purposes and to support lectures, presentations and conferences, e.g. data on female foreign national prisoners are included in ‘The Criminalisation of Migrant Women’ report published by the Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge in July 2012 | | Journalists | Used as a compendium of robust data on offender management so that an accurate and coherent story can be told on the prison population and probation service | | Voluntary sector | Data are used to inform policy work, responses to consultations and briefing papers by analysing trends and changes to the prison population, e.g. the Prison Reform Trust use published offender management data to compile the ‘Bromley Briefing Prison Factfiles’ | | General public | Data are used to respond to ad-hoc requests and requests made under the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act: offender management data is used to answer around 100 FOIs each year | Contact points

Press enquiries should be directed to the Ministry of Justice press office:

Tel: 020 3334 3536

Other enquiries about these statistics should be directed to:

Jonny Hughes Ministry of Justice Justice Statistics Analytical Services 7th Floor 102 Petty France London SW1H 9AJ

General enquiries about the statistical work of the Ministry of Justice can be e-mailed to: statistics.enquiries@justice.gsi.gov.uk

General information about the official statistics system of the UK is available from www.statistics.gov.uk

Ministry of Justice publishes data relating to offender management in England and Wales. Equivalent statistics for Scotland and Northern Ireland can be found at:

www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Crime-Justice

www.dojni.gov.uk/index/statistics-research/stats-research-publications.htm

This publication and associated spreadsheet files of the tables contained in this document and detailed information of definitions, sources and key legislative changes are available for download at

www.gov.uk/government/publications/offender-management-statistics-quarterly--2

© Crown copyright Produced by the Ministry of Justice Alternative formats are available on request from statistics.enquiries@justice.gsi.gov.uk